


Like a moth to the flame

by duesternis



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: AB's and marines go well together what else can i say, Fluff, M/M, Meet-Cute, caring for each other, i guess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-10
Updated: 2021-02-10
Packaged: 2021-03-16 15:34:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,290
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29334624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/duesternis/pseuds/duesternis
Summary: Scraping all his courage together Jerry winked at him with a little grin and Hedges winked back.
Relationships: William Jerry/William Hedges
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6
Collections: The Terror Rarepair Week 2021





	Like a moth to the flame

**Author's Note:**

> what do you mean by "who are these people?", are you trying to tell me you don't know the main characters of amc's The Terror (2018)??
> 
> thank you @itspilkiebitch for opening my eyes in regards to jedges
> 
> using prompt "frozen in" for day three

It’s not hard to share a name with another man aboard a ship in the Discovery Service, or really rather anywhere you go.  
Someone’s bound to be called by the same name.  
Parents aren’t very creative with that, it seems.

So, at quite a young age, Jerry had decided to go by his last name.  
It was short, rolled off the tongue nice and it didn’t make him one of the dozens of Williams or Bills milling the ships, the docks, the rigging.  
It was always a mess when someone called for a shipmate by first name and then dozens of men answered the call.  
Never happened for Jerry.

It also never happened for the Marines, who seemed to lose their first names when they put on the uniforms at the start of their career.  
Eye-catching, those uniforms.  
Red and white and gold and darkest blue.  
They make the most of even a mediocre man, not unlike the officer's uniforms.  
But red had always been Jerry's favourite colour.

And he's not the only one who likes the look of them, but it seems he’s the only one who caught an eye back in return.  
Or at least he likes to think so.  
Corporal Hedges.  
Decently tall, more than decently handsome with his cutting profile and gentle smile.  
Jerry especially likes the way his hair falls into his forehead when he looks down.  
One of the locks always touches the side of Hedges’ nose and he always brushes it away with elegant fingers.

It was easy to look at him when they all sat together in the warmth of the kitchen stove, fixing and mending and crafting whatever they all could get their hands on.  
The ice had packed in tightly around the ships, making so many sailors on a ship that was going nowhere obsolete.  
And idle hands were never good for morale, for they let to idle thoughts.  
So they kept busy.  
The lower decks had never been so clean, so tidy, the men never so bored out of their minds.  
There was only so much rope to check for rat-bites before it made your brain ooze out your ears.

But Hedges sat there, talking with his fellow marines, tucking his hair back behind his ear and then he threaded his needle anew.  
Fixing buttons on a shirt.  
Jerry turned back to the socks he was mending for Lane, the man useless with a needle. At the other end of the table the caulker’s mate was telling some tall tale from his adventures in London’s underbelly.  
Unpleasant fellow, and always a bit too thick with his smiles. Practically oozing.  
Very unlike Hedges' soft smiles, like an angel in a children's book.

Jerry looked back at Hedges, who was laughing now, elbowing the Marine next to him. He said something that had Hedges in stitches, shirt and its loose buttons momentarily forgotten in Hedges' lap.  
Mesmerizing.  
It was like watching Captain Crozier work his sextant, some kind of magic colouring the air golden.  
Hedges shook his head in laughter, hair bouncing slightly around his sharp jaw and looked over at Jerry.

Whose heart lodged itself in his throat and he smiled, legs clenching tightly under the desk.  
His own needle came to a standstill in Lane's socks, quite a few inches away from the actual hole that Jerry was supposed to be mending.  
Hedges nodded at him, still chuckling, eyes sparkling.  
Golden.  
Scraping all his courage together Jerry winked at him with a little grin and Hedges winked back.

“Jerry, right?”  
It was after supper, neither Jerry nor Hedges on watch duty.  
Jerry had settled in by a lamp, leafing through one of the volumes from the ship's library, not in the mood to really read, but unwilling to turn in quite yet.  
His hammock neighbour snored something terrible.  
“Yes,” he said, lifting his head from perusing the pages and found himself face to face with Hedges.  
With his winsome, small smile.  
His eyes sparkled in the low light from the lamp.

“We never really met before, I think.”  
“One should think that’s impossible in these crowded quarters, but here we are. Please, sit.”  
Jerry pointed at the bench across from him with a grin.  
Hedges sat down right next to him, their arms brushing.  
He smelled of soap and clean sweat and Jerry found his pulse beating heavily in his ears.  
This was a different kind of closeness than rubbing elbows with fellow soldiers by the wash basin.

“I’m sorry if I disturbed your reading. I’m Hedges.”  
As if Jerry wouldn’t know his name.  
William Hedges.  
Same given name. It was the first time that Jerry wasn't at least somewhat bothered by it.  
“No worries, I was just flipping through it. I'm Jerry.”  
He closed the book and Hedges smiled, hands folded on the wood.  
The lamp light coloured his knuckles a pale yellow. There was a deep red scrape on one, maybe the frost, maybe something else that had torn the thin skin.  
Jerry pointed at it, licked his lips.

“You should get some grease on that. Cuts are a nasty business in this cold.”  
“Oh, yes, it’s been plagueing me, I must say. But I keep forgetting to go see Doctor MacDonald about it.”  
He’d never have put Hedges down as forgetful, but it’s endearing, the way he pouts at his own hand.  
His forehead even crinkled adorably over his sad eyes.  
It made Jerry want to lift his chin with two fingers and kiss the pout right off his lips.  
Maybe in a few weeks time, if this kept going.  
There was nothing else to do anyway.

“I have some woolgrease, wait a moment.”  
Hedges lifted his head and opened his mouth to say something, but Jerry put a hand on his shoulder and walked over to the sailor’s chests.  
With one reach into his he had the little tin in hand and joined Hedges again by the lamp.  
“Here,” he said and opened the tin, dipping his pinky in and holding his other hand out for Hedges’ scraped knuckle.  
“There you are.”  
Smiling again Hedges rested his hand in Jerry’s.  
It was larger than it looked, elegant, yes, but also calloused and rough from the cold. The nails were square and cut short, kept very neat.  
The skin was very cold to the touch.  
Jerry carefully rubbed grease into the broken skin, Hedges’ fingers curling slightly around his palm.  
Like a little bird, seeking the first rays of sunlight in the spring.

“You have warm hands, Jerry. Hard to find, these days.”  
Jerry laughed softly and covered Hedges’ knuckles with his hand.  
Clasped between his palms like this Hedges’ hand slowly stopped being quite so cold.  
“Always ready to warm some hands around here.”  
He winked at Hedges and Hedges smiled, his lips pursing into an almost coy shape.  
The twinkle in his eye unmasked that illusion thouroughly.  
The man likely didn’t have a coy bone in his body.  
Jerry liked that.  
Liked a man who wasn’t shy to ask for what he wanted.

“Thank you, Jerry, I’ll keep that in mind.”  
Smoothly, but not unkindly, Hedges stood, pulled his hand slowly out of Jerry’s hold.  
“Next time I’m frozen up like that I will find you.”  
Jerry smiled and closed the tin of woolgrease again.  
“Be sure to, Hedges, I'd love to help.”

This time it was Hedges who put a hand on Jerry’s shoulder, giving it a squeeze, before he left to presumably climb into his hammock and sleep.  
Jerry sat a while longer, fingering the pages of the book, eyes glued to the warm light of the lamp.  
Hedges’ hair had that shade too, like burnished bronze by the fireside.  
Simply gorgeous.

**Author's Note:**

> hello have you come to care for hedges too?


End file.
